Peter Dorman — The Debate over Student Loans: The Issue Is Not the Issue

Once upon a time, when I was young, there was a two-tiered system in the US, with expensive private colleges and universities for those who could afford them and nearly-free public education for everyone else.  Then decisions were made.  The US has a mostly decentralized structure in which the provision and financing of public higher education occurs at the state level, but somehow, miraculously, every state in the union simultaneously began a process of shifting costs from taxpayers to students and their families.

I would dearly like to know who made these decisions and how they were disseminated to all the state-level boards, commissions and legislatures.  Here’s my uninformed speculation on why this happened:

Econospeak
The Debate over Student Loans: The Issue Is Not the Issue

Peter Dorman